No Tax Hike In Carbon Budget Panel To Unveil $28 Million Spending Plan

December 06, 1994|by WALT ROLAND, The Morning Call

Carbon County commissioners on Thursday will showcase a 1995 county budget of about $28 million, with no tax increase.

Debt incurred through bonds because of the new $8.2 million county prison will not require an increase in the county's 32.2-mill real estate tax rate or the 14.6-mill occupation tax revamped for 1994.

The jail was completed this year.

"Not bad, when you do not have to raise taxes and can open a new jail in the same year," Commissioners Chairman Dean D.W. DeLong said yesterday.

"We also took some big hits in the failure of some businesses who have not paid their real estate taxes, and the downsizing of others, which led to sizable decreases in property valuations and, therefore, less in the amount of taxes they pay," he said.

Twenty-five mills of the real estate tax rate is earmarked for the county general fund and 7.2 mills for debt service on bonds.

DeLong explained that the county projected revenues of about $1.5 million for the first year of the occupational tax.

"Next year (1995) we figure we might be getting about $2.2 million, based on new names being added to the occupational rolls ... those found by tax assessors to be in the work force who hadn't been paying, new residents moving into the county and young people moving into the job market," he said.

The 1995 budget will reflect total revenues of about $6.24 million from real estate and occupation tax levies, he said.

The rest of the county budget revenues come from state and federal funding, income from fees charged by county row offices, the county courts, and other county operations, investment earnings and other sources.

County spending in 1995 will be about $1 million less than the 1994 total of $29.9 million because of the completion of the jail project, DeLong said.

A costly major project for the county next year will be construction of a new 911 emergency communications center next to the new jail on Broad Mountain in Nesquehoning.

Other major expenses on the horizon are a new roof and heating system improvements at Weatherwood, the county nursing home in Weatherly.

When Delong and Commissioners Vice Chairman Thomas C. Gerhard inaugurated the occupation tax, they reduced the real estate rate for 1994 from 30 to 25 mills.

They also eliminated the 4-mill personal property tax on certain bonds, mortgages and other investments and a $5 per capita tax.

Commissioner John D. Mogilski, minority member of the board, voted against the 1994 budget and the accompanying occupation tax.

The legal limit is 20 mills for the occupation tax and 25 mills for the real estate tax.

DeLong and Gerhard petitioned county court for 30 mills of real estate tax for 1993. the petition was granted after a review of the county's emergency financial condition at a public hearing in court.

DeLong and Gerhard support the Pennsylvania State Association of County Commissioners in promoting either an earned income income tax or a sales tax or both, at the county level, to shift the main tax burden from homeowners and small businesses.

The preliminary 1995 budget will be made public during the commissioners' meeting at 10:30 a.m. Thursday in the third floor conference room of the Courthouse Annex in Jim Thorpe.

The budget will be available for public inspection for 20 days before the scheduled adoption in final form on Dec. 29.